By now, the adjectives have become commonplace for Barack Obama and his administration.

Progressive.

Game-Changing.

Wilsonian.

Yes, similarities do exist between Barack Obama and his Democratic predecessor, Woodrow Wilson. Both are frigidly demeanored but messianic academics. With barely two years of government experience in statewide office, each assumed the presidency and presided over fundamental overhauls of the existing American system.

But here's where one can find another little-noticed but perhaps telling comparison: their work habits.

Barack Obama is already more famous for vacations, golfing, and theater-going than he ought to be. In a period of economic crisis, he is off to Maine and Hawaii and Broadway and Martha's Vineyard. His wife communes with the King of Spain. In time of war, he ducks a Memorial Day ceremony to vacation in America's favorite sun-and-fun vacation spot -- Chicago. He plays basketball. He works out. He golfs and golfs -- and golfs.

Since assuming office, President Obama has garnered his fair share of high-profile critics. But few have been as omnipresent and implacable as John Bolton. From his near constant appearances on Fox News and HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” to his steady stream of op-eds in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Daily News, the 61-year-old former Ambassador to the United Nations and Under Secretary of State for Arms Control under President George W. Bush has been relentless in his critiques of President Obama’s agenda, especially in the realm of foreign policy.

In his office at the American Enterprise Institute, which is situated directly next to former Vice President Dick Cheney’s office, Bolton was far from reserved while talking to The Daily Caller about what he finds so alarming in President Obama’s foreign and domestic policies, how history will view the last Bush administration, and the possibility of a 2012 run for president.

Liberalism under siege is an ugly sight indeed. Just yesterday it was all hope and change and returning power to the people. But the people have proved so disappointing. Their recalcitrance has, in only 19 months, turned the predicted 40-year liberal ascendancy (James Carville) into a full retreat. Ah, the people, the little people, the small-town people, the "bitter" people, as Barack Obama in an unguarded moment once memorably called them, clinging "to guns or religion or" -- this part is less remembered -- "antipathy toward people who aren't like them."

That's a polite way of saying: clinging to bigotry. And promiscuous charges of bigotry are precisely how our current rulers and their vast media auxiliary react to an obstreperous citizenry that insists on incorrect thinking.

Radio and television personality Glenn Beck today hosted hundreds of thousands of rallying citizens from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. In what was an amazingly apolitical rally, Beck and his fellow speakers focused on three themes: faith, hope, and charity.

The event, billed by its organizers “Restoring Honor,” harkened back to revered American leaders, from the Founding Fathers to Martin Luther King Jr., and religious figures, particularly Moses, whom he continuously referred to as “the man with the stick and burning bush.”

Offering a grim picture of where the country is today, while refraining from critiquing specific politicians or even particular policies, Beck hit a hopeful pitch, urging his minions to be more like the great Americans and religious figures he praised.

There are a lot of good people – people with whom I agree on most things – who are put off by Glenn Beck. Sometimes I’m put off by Glenn Beck. There are conclusions he makes about history that I find simplistic, off-center, or just plain wrong. His on-screen persona can be over the top.

But today, I come not to bury Glenn Beck but to praise him. Because he does something right that matters more than almost anything else: he stands where he believes he’s been told by God to stand, and says what he knows he has to say.

The things that discourage us from doing that have great power. For many people, it just feels indecorous. Personality and upbringing are a tremendous self-deterrent. For a lot of others, the natural fear of being misunderstood and thought a fool is a mighty influence. There are many who agree with much of what Beck says, but are discouraged from saying it themselves, because of the long experience we all have with the spin-and-obfuscation machine that is automatically set in motion by any conservative-right assertion, no matter how nuanced. Beck actually makes some insightful and complex arguments, when he’s dealing with things he has gained substantial knowledge of, but all his arguments are misrepresented on principle in the leftosphere: reworded and distorted to put him in a bad light.

The EPA was set to begin banning lead bullets and, suddenly, changed their tune. Really? I don't believe them or trust them, in any way.

Look out, America. Every freedom we have is being systematically destroyed by our government. If we are allowed to vote in November (I'm not convinced we will be because this government is so radical and may conjure a way to prohibit elections) we must vote against every politician that believes in big government - no matter their party affiliation!

To say our country is in peril is an understatement of the facts. - Reggie

NRA Warns Against New Gun Control Push ... From EPA

The National Rifle Association, already on high alert over gun control rumors, has gone to battle stations to fight a new scheme before the Environmental Protection Agency to restrict hunters and anglers from using lead bullets, shot and sinkers.

Chief NRA lobbyist Chris Cox charges in a letter to the EPA that the effort amounts to "a vehicle to implement gun control" and could end hunting by most who can't afford the higher priced alternatives to lead.

In a swift and unexpected decision, the Environmental Protection Agency today rejected a petition from environmental groups to ban the use of lead in bullets and shotgun shells, claiming it doesn't have jurisdiction to weigh on the controversial Second Amendment issue. The decision came just hours after the Drudge Report posted stories from Washington Whispers and the Weekly Standard about how gun groups were fighting the lead bullet ban.

The EPA had planned to solicit public responses to the petition for two months, but this afternoon issued a statement rejecting a 100-page request from the Center for Biological Diversity, the American Bird Conservancy, and three other groups for a ban on lead bullets, shot, and fishing sinkers. The agency is still considering what to do about sinkers.

May today's Restoring Honor rally be as significant for our nation as the rally held at the Lincoln Memorial on this date in 1963. We must return to our founding principles and the God of our Fathers in order for this country to survive. - Reggie

Friday, August 27, 2010

For those of us that couldn't attend the 8/28 Rally in Washington, D.C., there are two ways to see it online. Facebook and C-SPAN will stream it live and you can also watch it on C-SPAN's television channel.

In front of the Lincoln Memorial in June, a group of students caught up in a moment of spontaneous patriotism broke into song. But the US Park Police were quick to shush the members of the Young America’s Foundation, saying singing is not allowed at the memorial. The song that was stifled? “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

So much for freedom of speech.

At the Martin Luther King, Jr., Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta this July, an official at the memorial to one of the greatest civil rights leaders in the world – my Uncle Martin – removed a bullhorn from the hands of Father Frank Pavone, an internationally recognized leader of the pro-life movement. We were a group more than 100 strong, in Atlanta to declare that abortion is the greatest violation of civil rights in our day. We brought a wreath to lay at Uncle Martin’s grave while we prayed, but due to a King Center official’s barricade at the gravesite, we weren’t allowed. The National Park Service said that would constitute a demonstration.

Lone Star state won't participate in Obama's lawless policy

The state's slogan is "Don't mess with Texas." But the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is doing just that, and at stake is whether the Obama administration can impose its global-warming agenda without a vote of Congress.

President Obama's EPA is already well down the path to regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, something the act was not designed to do. It has a problem, however, because shoehorning greenhouse gases into that 40-year-old law would force churches, schools, warehouses, commercial kitchens and other sources to obtain costly and time-consuming permits. It would grind the economy to a halt, and the likely backlash would doom the whole scheme.

The EPA, determined to move forward anyway, is attempting to rewrite the Clean Air Act administratively via a "tailoring rule," which would reduce the number of regulated sources. The problem with that approach? It's illegal. The EPA has no authority to rewrite the law. To pull it off, the EPA needs every state with a State Implementation Plan to rewrite all of its statutory thresholds as well.

State testmakers played favorites when quizzing high-schoolers on world religions -- giving Islam and Buddhism the kid-gloves treatment while socking it to Christianity, critics say.

Teachers complain that the reading selections from the Regents exam in global history and geography given last week featured glowing passages pertaining to Muslim society but much more critical essay excerpts on the subject of Christianity.

"There should have been a little balance in there," said one Brooklyn teacher who administered the exam but did not want to be identified.

"To me, this was offensive because it's just so inappropriate and the timing of it was piss-poor," he added, referring to the debate over the plan to build a mosque near Ground Zero.

It can’t be done without confronting mainstream Islam and its sharia agenda.

‘Secularism can never enjoy a general acceptance in an Islamic society.” The writer was not one of those sulfurous Islamophobes decried by CAIR and the professional Left. Quite the opposite: It was Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual guide and a favorite of the Saudi royal family. He made this assertion in his book, How the Imported Solutions Disastrously Affected Our Ummah, an excerpt of which was published by the Saudi Gazette just a couple of months ago.

This was Qaradawi the “progressive” Muslim intellectual, much loved by Georgetown University’s burgeoning Islamic-studies programs. Like Harvard, Georgetown has been purchased into submission by tens of millions of Saudi petrodollars. In its resulting ardor to put Americans at ease about Islam, the university somehow manages to look beyond Qaradawi’s fatwas calling for the killing of American troops in Iraq and for suicide bombings in Israel. Qaradawi, they tell us, is a “moderate.” In fact, as Robert Spencer quips, if you were to say Islam and secularism cannot co-exist, John Esposito, Georgetown’s apologist-in-chief, would call you an Islamophobe; but when Qaradawi says it, no problem — according to Esposito, he’s a “reformist.”

And he’s not just any reformist. Another Qaradawi fan, Feisal Rauf, the similarly “moderate” imam behind the Ground Zero mosque project, tells us Qaradawi is also “the most well-known legal authority in the whole Muslim world today.”

A decorated Gulf War veteran was holding a narrow lead over Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the Alaska Republican Senate primary, as ballots continued to be counted Wednesday in what could shape up to be a stunning political upset.

Polls taken before primary day had shown Murkowski, a two-term senator from an Alaska political dynasty, leading handily against the first-time candidate. But challenger Joe Miller insisted all along that the state's polling was unreliable -- as of Wednesday morning, Miller held a 2,000-vote lead.

With 98 percent of precincts reporting, he had 51 percent and Murkowski had 49 percent. The number of uncounted absentee ballots, though, exceeded the number of votes separating the candidates.

Government agents can sneak onto your property in the middle of the night, put a GPS device on the bottom of your car and keep track of everywhere you go. This doesn't violate your Fourth Amendment rights, because you do not have any reasonable expectation of privacy in your own driveway — and no reasonable expectation that the government isn't tracking your movements.

That is the bizarre — and scary — rule that now applies in California and eight other Western states. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which covers this vast jurisdiction, recently decided the government can monitor you in this way virtually anytime it wants — with no need for a search warrant. (Read about one man's efforts to escape the surveillance state.)

It is a dangerous decision — one that, as the dissenting judges warned, could turn America into the sort of totalitarian state imagined by George Orwell. It is particularly offensive because the judges added insult to injury with some shocking class bias: the little personal privacy that still exists, the court suggested, should belong mainly to the rich.

We are seeing the loss of privacy unfold before our eyes in a huge scale. The people need to rise up and stop this lunacy. Now we are going to all be subjected X-Rays without consent and knowledge that it is happening. I heard of people doing something similar to this. They are called a peeping tom and it is illegal last time I check.

- Michael

As the privacy controversy around full-body security scans begins to simmer, it’s worth noting that courthouses and airport security checkpoints aren’t the only places where backscatter x-ray vision is being deployed. The same technology, capable of seeing through clothes and walls, has also been rolling out on U.S. streets.

PHOENIX - The son of former Vice President Dan Quayle has won the GOP nomination in Arizona's 3rd Congressional District.

Ben Quayle led the field of 10 Republicans by nearly 5 percentage points late on election night. He had 23 percent of the vote, and his nearest competitor, businessman Steve Moak, had just under 18 percent.

Intel chief executive Paul Otellini offered a depressing set of observations about the economy and the Obama administration Monday evening, coupled with a dark commentary on the future of the technology industry if nothing changes.

Otellini's remarks during dinner at the Technology Policy Institute's Aspen Forum here amounted to a warning to the administration officials and assorted Capitol Hill aides in the audience: Unless government policies are altered, he predicted, "the next big thing will not be invented here. Jobs will not be created here."

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

CNN political analyst Gloria Borger recently posed a question: "How does the great communicator, Barack Obama, lose a communications battle?"

The assumption is revealing. The Obama hyperbole has gradually faded into reality. Said to be a brilliant politician. Said to be a great communicator. The conventional perceptions of Obama were flawed from the outset. The political class has gradually come to recognize those flaws in isolation. But enough aberrations construct a norm. The presumed exceptions become the rule. And in time, the premises themselves require reexamination.

Expect to hear a lot about how much the Iraq war cost in the days ahead from Democrats worried about voter wrath against their unprecedented spending excesses.

The meme is simple: The economy is in a shambles because of Bush's economic policies and his war in Iraq. As American Thinker's Randall Hoven points out, that's the message being peddled by lefties as diverse as former Clinton political strategist James Carville, economist Joseph Stiglitz, and The Nation's Washington editor, Christopher Hayes.
Read More>>

A US court ordered a temporary halt to federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, which President Barack Obama had authorized, saying it involved the destruction of human embryos.

US District Court Judge Royce Lamberth ruled in favor of a coalition of groups, including several Christian organizations, which had sought a temporary injunction on funding of the research ahead of a planned lawsuit.

"Plaintiffs have demonstrated a strong likelihood of success on the merits," Lamberth said.

The coalition argues that President Obama's March 2009 lifting of a ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research violates legislation that prohibits government funding for research in which embryos are discarded or destroyed.

With a school like this you would think that California's economy is flying high. Oh but wait...it's not. We have such irresponsible people in government positions. These people just must be clueless. Citizens who own businesses are held to a much higher standard of responsibility then those spending our tax dollars.

- Michael

LOS ANGELES – Next month's opening of the Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools will be auspicious for a reason other than its both storied and infamous history as the former Ambassador Hotel, where the Democratic presidential contender was assassinated in 1968.

With an eye-popping price tag of $578 million, it will mark the inauguration of the nation's most expensive public school ever.

Monday, August 23, 2010

The first school in the D.C. area named after the current president opens Monday morning as the school year begins in Prince George's County.

Barack Obama Elementary School opens its doors in Upper Marlboro, Md., for the first time Monday. The school is being touted as being an environmentally friendly "green" school. There have been other schools named after President Obama in the country, but this will be a first in his own backyard in the D.C. region.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Thomas Sowell, the Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution and author of Dismantling America, tells Hoover research fellow Peter Robinson that if the Obama agenda is not stopped in the November 2010 elections, he doesn't know how it will ever be stopped.

A growing number of New York construction workers are vowing not to work on the mosque planned near Ground Zero.

"It's a very touchy thing because they want to do this on sacred ground," said Dave Kaiser, 38, a blaster who is working to rebuild the World Trade Center site.

"I wouldn't work there, especially after I found out about what the imam said about U.S. policy being responsible for 9/11," Kaiser said.

The grass-roots movement is gaining momentum on the Internet. One construction worker created the "Hard Hat Pledge" on his blog and asked others to vow not to work on the project if it stays on Park Place.

"Thousands of people are signing up from all over the country," said creator Andy Sullivan, a construction worker from Brooklyn. "People who sell glass, steel, lumber, insurance. They are all refusing to do work if they build there."

"Hopefully, this will be a tool to get them to move it," he said. "I got a problem with this ostentatious building looming over Ground Zero."

Fair enough, I guess. The building is not, in fact, at Ground Zero — although I’m not sure why not, given the various leftist arguments that putting up a mosque/Islamic community center as close as possible to the site of the attack is the greatest, most quintessentially patriotic thing ever. Rather, the building is two blocks north, which was close enough to have the landing gear from one of the jets crash into it on 9/11. (Jim Treacher suggests “Debris Field Mosque” instead.) But if we’re going to be sticklers, let’s be sticklers:

Here is some guidance on covering the NYC mosque story, with assists from Chad Roedemeier in the NYC bureau and Terry Hunt in Washington:
1. We should continue to avoid the phrase “ground zero mosque” or “mosque at ground zero” on all platforms. (We’ve very rarely used this wording, except in slugs, though we sometimes see other news sources using the term.) The site of the proposed Islamic center and mosque is not at ground zero, but two blocks away in a busy commercial area. We should continue to say it’s “near” ground zero, or two blocks away…
In short headlines, some ways to refer to the project include:
_ mosque 2 blocks from WTC site
_ Muslim (or Islamic) center near WTC site
_ mosque near ground zero
_ mosque near WTC site

Saturday, August 21, 2010

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent threat to “investigate those opposing the mosque” at Ground Zero is indicative of how sick our once-free society has become. Clearly her remarks were directed at those of us who are leading the opposition to the gross offense and humiliation of the Ground Zero Islamic supremacist mosque.

But more than that, it is a direct threat to the 70% of Americans vehemently opposed to the mosque.

The U.S. Department of Education’s spokesperson hung up on The Daily Caller Wednesday when seeking clarification regarding the Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s planned speech at an Aug. 28 protest march that the Rev. Al Sharpton and his National Action Network (NAN) are holding to counter Fox News commentator Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” rally.

The NAN’s “Reclaim the Dream” march is an attempt to keep attention off Beck’s highly publicized rally happening the same day in the same city, redirecting the focus to what Sharpton and the NAN say is the real meaning of the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “I have a dream” speech. The date, Aug. 28, is the 47th anniversary of King’s iconic speech.

Duncan recently wrapped up a nationwide education tour with Sharpton and former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, which is the only topic the Department of Education would comment on.

I can't begin to imagine that this new regulation is the will of the people. If it is not the will of the people we must ask how it stands. The government is no longer subject to the people. The people have allowed themselves to be subject to the government and that is a scary thought.

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- It would be a stretch to say that Big Brother will hang out in Clevelanders' trash cans, but the city plans to sort through curbside trash to make sure residents are recycling -- and fine them $100 if they don't.

The move is part of a high-tech collection system the city will roll out next year with new trash and recycling carts embedded with radio frequency identification chips and bar codes.

The chips will allow city workers to monitor how often residents roll carts to the curb for collection. If a chip show a recyclable cart hasn't been brought to the curb in weeks, a trash supervisor will sort through the trash for recyclables.

On September 11th our country was attacked by MUSLIMS who were doing what their beloved Qur'an tells them to do; Kill the infidels. Why should the whole country not appose this mosque being built?

Last but not least is the shocking truth that many people don't trust Muslims. Really? It would be more shocking to me if someone said they trusted Muslims. Have we seen anyone else behead someone on public television? Have we seen anyone else saw the head of a girl off with a pocket knife while her boyfriend is made to watch? Has anyone else in recent years attacked US soil claiming more then 3000 American lives? Iran, a Muslim country is building nuclear weapons. Usually if you are told that someone is trustworthy you are given reasons why they are trustworthy. If someone is peaceful then there will be proof of peace. We are told over and over that Islam is a peaceful religion but the real evidence points the way. Don't beleive what you are told. Believe the facts.

I am posting a link below to a previous article I wrote that should set your mind at ease on this point if the previous examples were not enough. America needs to oppose Islam and turn to the one and only true and living God! Through Him alone will the restoration of our country come.

Opponents of the planned Islamic community center and mosque near Ground Zero in lower Manhattan have public opinion firmly in their corner. According to a new TIME poll, 61% of respondents oppose the construction of the Park51/Cordoba House project, compared with 26% who support it. More than 70% concur with the premise that proceeding with the plan would be an insult to the victims of the attacks on the World Trade Center. Opposition to the project appears to derive largely from the conviction that the proposed site of the project — just two blocks from Ground Zero, in a building that formerly housed a Burlington Coat Factory outlet — is so close to "hallowed ground," as President Obama put it.
Yet the survey also revealed that many Americans harbor lingering animosity toward Muslims. Twenty-eight percent of voters do not believe Muslims should be eligible to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. Nearly one-third of the country thinks adherents of Islam should be barred from running for President — a slightly higher percentage than the 24% who mistakenly believe the current occupant of the Oval Office is himself a Muslim. In all, just 47% of respondents believe Obama is a Christian; 24% declined to respond to the question or said they were unsure, and 5% believe he is neither Christian nor Muslim.

Greek Orthodox leaders trying to rebuild the only church destroyed in the Sept. 11 terror attacks expressed shock this week after learning, via Fox News, that government officials had killed a deal to relocate the church.

The St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church, once a tiny, four-story building in the shadows of lower Manhattan, was destroyed in 2001 by one of the falling World Trade Center towers. Nobody from the church was hurt in the attack, but the congregation has, for the past eight years, been trying to rebuild its house of worship.

Though talks between the church and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey stalled last year, church leaders say they've been trying to kick-start discussions ever since. But amid debate over whether a proposed Islamic community center should go forward near Ground Zero, government officials threw cold water on the prospect of any deal with the church -- telling Fox News the deal is off the table.

Confronted with the Port Authority's verdict, Father Mark Arey, of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, said it's the first he's heard that.

Brewer on July 30 floated the idea of making "tweaks" to the law shortly after a federal judge blocked implementation of numerous provisions. Legislative aides said Tuesday the idea has been shelved, at least temporarily, mainly because of the state's pending appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The developers of an Islamic cultural center that would include a mosque near Ground Zero have rejected Gov. David Paterson's offer to help them find a different site.

Paterson said today the group is apparently committed to building in the proposed site. "I think they would like to stay where they are, and I certainly respect that and I certainly respect them," Paterson said.

But, Paterson said the dialogue would have been useful as the project has ignited nationwide debate over freedom of religion and anger over the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.. "Having said that, how much more foresighted would it have been if the Imam who is the developer of the project had been willing to hear what we are actually talking about?"

Sometimes you just have to scratch your head and ask yourself what the US government is thinking. They are putting all their efforts into suing a border state that is trying to protect their borders from illegal immigrants. Meanwhile instead of the US Government supporting those efforts they instead try to thwart them. What kind of crazy, backward people are running this government? People somehow have heard the term "illegal immigrant" so much they don't hear the word "illegal" any more.

- Michael

A federal investigation of a controversial Arizona sheriff known for tough immigration enforcement has intensified in recent days, escalating the conflict between the Obama administration and officials in the border state.

Justice Department officials in Washington have issued a rare threat to sue Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio if he does not cooperate with their investigation of whether he discriminates against Hispanics. The civil rights inquiry is one of two that target the man who calls himself "America's toughest sheriff." A federal grand jury in Phoenix is examining whether Arpaio has used his power to investigate and intimidate political opponents and whether his office misappropriated government money, sources said.

The standoff comes just weeks after the Justice Department sued Arizona and Gov. Jan Brewer (R) because of the state's new immigration law, heightening tensions over the issue ahead of November's midterm elections. The renewed debate has focused attention on Arpaio, a former D.C. police officer who runs a 3,800-employee department, and a state at the epicenter of the controversy over the nation's estimated 12 million illegal immigrants.

Updated 08.05.10

According to the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are nearly 31 million people currently unemployed -- that's including those involuntarily working parttime and those who want a job, but have given up on trying to find one. In the face of the worst economic upheaval since the Great Depression, millions of Americans are hurting. "The Decline: The Geography of a Recession," as created by labor writer LaToya Egwuekwe, serves as a vivid representation of just how much. Watch the deteriorating transformation of the U.S. economy from January 2007 -- approximately one year before the start of the recession -- to the most recent unemployment data available today.

Even some who support same-sex marriage worry that, in striking down California's voter-approved proposition defining marriage as between one man and one woman, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker went too far. They are right -- and not the only ones who should be concerned. Walker's ruling is indefensible as a matter of law wholly apart from its result.

By refusing to acknowledge binding Supreme Court precedent, substantial evidence produced at trial that was contrary to the holding and plain common sense, the ruling exhibits none of the requirements of a traditional decision. This opinion is arbitrary and capricious, and its alarming legal methodology and overtly policy-driven tenor are too extreme to stand.

Regardless of whether one agrees with the result, structurally sound opinions always confront binding legal precedent. Walker's is a clear exception because the U.S. Supreme Court has spoken on whether a state's refusal to authorize same-sex marriage violates the equal protection and due process clauses of the 14th Amendment. In 1972, Baker v. Nelson, a case over whether Minnesota violated the Constitution by issuing marriage licenses only to opposite-sex couples, was unanimously thrown out on the merits, for lack of a substantial federal question. The Supreme Court's action establishes a binding precedent in favor of Proposition 8. But Judge Walker's ruling doesn't mention Baker, much less attempt to distinguish it or accept its findings.